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Example of trade group social media propaganda #Socialmedia #Propaganda

Most people view propaganda as something undertaken by governments, especially in war time, and by politicians. But propaganda and the methods of propaganda are employed every single day by all types of organizations and participants.

By sharing messages like this, you become a propagandist in the chain of propaganda!

On Facebook, a “Like” or “Comment” is identical to “Share” – which means you may be “sharing” items you do not realize you are sharing!

The idea is to share this post with your friends (cut off at the bottom was a link to sign a petition). By sharing with your friends, the message takes on the from of “get on the bandwagon” and join the crowd!

The advent of social media changes the propaganda distribution landscape. What was once (100 years ago) undertaken through speeches and news reports, migrated to radio broadcasts, then television – and now social media.

Bizarrely, millions of people voluntarily sign up to Facebook pages that are pure propaganda – and intentionally subscribe to an onslaught of daily propaganda messaging!

Social media turns everyone into a social media propagandist.

Every time you share a post, you become part of a chain of propaganda and propagandists. On Facebook, “Share”, “Like” and “Comment” are identical! Every time you like a public post on Facebook, Facebook’s shares your “Like” into your timeline that your friend’s see. In this way, “Likes” become automatic sharing – merely by signifying agreement, you have turned in to a cog in the propaganda machine! When you click “Like”, ask yourself, is this something I want to share with others?

Another Example

The following poster came through my FB news feed, shared from a friend. This is alarming and instinctively, many of us will wish to share it with our friends, partially as “virtue-signalling” (signaling to our friends that we are a “good person”) and partially with concern that perhaps by doing something, we will help solve the problem.

Except the claim is false.

We will look more closely at this later. The short answer is that a huge non-profit created this propaganda poster by using a survey that did not measure hunger, but which computed a figure of “1 in 7 people” PER YEAR, and then translated that 1 in 7 people go to bed hungry every night!

The point here is that everyone engages in propaganda. It’s tempting to say that oil pipelines in Canada are just corporate propaganda. But seldom will we note that a huge non-profit is engaged in the same practice. In the end, it is all the same – using the documented methods of propaganda to further someone’s agenda.